


Disney'd

by veterization



Category: Supernatural RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-08-01
Updated: 2012-08-01
Packaged: 2017-11-11 05:12:43
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 18,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/474887
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/veterization/pseuds/veterization
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jared kisses Jensen while watching Tangled. Jensen proceeds to be haunted by Disney.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Disney'd

**Author's Note:**

> I love this story simply because it inspired me to dig out out Disney classics and watch them all over again. It also reminded me why I love writing. I hope you get as much joy out of it as I did.

_"All dreams are fulfillments of wishes."_ **\--Sigmund Freud**   
  
_"Even miracles take a little time."_ **\--Fairy Godmother, Cinderella**

  
Jensen swears this was not his idea or his DVD.  
  
He wasn't even aware that Jared had a Disney movie collection so enormous until he had taken the time to browse through his DVD rack while Jared heated up leftover pizza and procured chilled beers, ranging from a 1937 version of _Snow White_ to _Tangled_. Jensen snorts around his beer and waves the disk in Jared's direction.  
  
"Jared, are you kidding me?"  
  
Jared peers over from where's he's pinning a handful of napkins in between his teeth and carrying over a greasy pizza box that's balancing his own opened beer threatening to slosh over the slices of cheesy leftover pizza slices and douse their dinner plans in alcohol. He catches sight of the film in Jensen's hand, grins around the napkins, and sets down the pizza box on the coffee table.  
  
"That movie's adorable, man, how could you not have seen it?" Jared asks around a mouthful of pepperoni, and Jensen reassesses the DVD. The cover's sporting the animated figures of a beautiful blonde woman with her hair running amok over the DVD alongside a studly man similarly enveloped in the woman's blond curls winking coquettishly. It's full of vivid colors and grass so lush and green it ceases to be realistic, a movie meant to be watched by young girls braiding their hair and cooing over Disney romance while gossiping with their friends over eligible junior high athletes. Jensen looks over at Jared, beer in one hand and pizza slipping from his other hand, and realizes that Jared gets away with owning movies like this because he happens to be graced with the epitome of manliness everywhere a body and mind can be graced with such traces, from burly muscles to a thick Texan accent that crawls out unannounced when Jared's boneless and exhausted after an endless day of shooting.  
  
"Should I grab my sleepover stuff and my hairbrushes?" Jensen asks, reading the chipper blurb from the back of the DVD. Jared stuffs the last of his pizza slice into his mouth and nudges Jensen's shoulder into the DVD player with his foot.  
  
"Put it in!" Jared says, "Real men watch Disney movies."  
  
Jensen gives one last critical look to the cover before slipping the disk into the player and settling into the couch cushion by Jared. He's seen his fair share of Disney movies in his teenage years when Mac would watch _The Little Mermaid_ on repeat and he would catch every word through the wall separating their rooms until he had the ability to recite and sing along to all of the tracks from the movie as well as his little sister.  
  
Jared wrangles the remote out from in between the cushions and presses play. Jensen looks over at Jared's face, chasing a string of cheese connecting his mouth to the next slice of pizza with his teeth and eyes alight when the telltale Disney logo shines on the screen, and dully realizes that living with Jared is like living with a Disney character in the first place. His personality is vibrant enough to bounce out of television screens and his morale is unbreakable. If he can handle overwhelming hourly doses of Jared Padalecki, he can handle two hours of disgustingly sweet romance and syrupy singing.  
  
Jensen shakes his head, snorts into his beer, and grabs a slice of pizza.  
  
\---  
  
The pizza, a bit too oily and chewy after a spin in the microwave for thirty seconds, is gone with nothing but a gargantuan grease stain and bits of crisp, fallen pepperoni marring the box when Rapunzel and Flynn Rider are gallivanting through the city and preparing the boat to watch the lanterns. So far, the singing has been on key and the plot hasn't caused Jensen to throw his shoe at the television to punish it for its unbearable explosion of sugary sweetness. He's even laughed at a few bits of dialogue and found his foot swaying along to the thugs' rendition of _I've Got a Dream_ , which earned him a hefty chuckle from Jared that lasted well until the end of the song.  
  
On the screen, the lanterns begin floating into the sky and bobbing amid the boat, and when a mellow, soft tune picks up, Jensen knows he's in for the romantic moment. Mandy Moore's voice starts singing _I See the Light_ as Rapunzel smiles and plays with the lanterns to send them gently sailing with the breeze while Flynn watches her endearing antics with a smile mirroring hers. The song is admittedly adorable, and when Jensen looks over, he finds that Jared's eyes are a little misty.  
  
"Jared," he whispers, and Jared jumps when he realizes his watery eyes are busted and fixedly addresses the television, "Are you going to be able to handle the rest of the movie?"  
  
Jensen gets smacked over the chest with a greasy palm for his mockery and grabs another beer that Jared promptly steals from his fingers as Rapunzel and Flynn nearly kiss among their sea of lanterns.  
  
\---  
  
Jensen is on his fifth beer by the time Rapunzel is making the realization that Mother Gothel is an evil, diabolical villain with no biological attachment to her as Flynn dashes to Rapunzel's aid to her isolated tower on his noble horse. Jared is surrounded with a similar littering of empty bottles, one lolling sadly around his ankles. Neither of them bothered to peel themselves off the couch in order to flick on a light to soothe their eyelids, bathing both of them only in the illumination of the television. In their slightly hazy buzz of beer that would make itself apparent the moment they would try to balance themselves on their drunken feet upon standing up from the sofa, the deficit of light only creates a soothing glow from the television that doesn't hurt their retinas.  
  
"You are so Flynn Rider," Jensen slurs, squinting at Jared through the dim light, "You really are. You have the same hair."  
  
Jared rakes a hand through his unruly hair until it flops into his face like a ragged curtain. He shakes his head and blows up at his bangs until they're haphazardly blown from his line of vision. He grins at Jensen in a crooked, tipsy beam that tugs up at the left corner of his lips lopsidedly. Jensen blinks and reaches out to poke at the dip of Jared's dimple.  
  
"But I don't own a horse."  
  
"You could own a horse."  
  
Jared pauses, as if considering Jensen's statement while Flynn jumps from his horse and urgently climbs Rapunzel's tower, and weighs his options of the pros and cons of owning an animal that needs a stable and daily oats under the compromise that he gets to gallop through fields and save damsels in distress on his studly horse.  
  
"I _could_ own a horse," he confirms with a slow nod that showcases just how much thought Jared is superfluously putting into this hypothetical situation, eliciting a snort from Jensen that comes out more like a slurred garble of a inebriated chuckle, "Now shut up for the good part."  
  
\---  
  
Jensen doesn't know how they went through multiple cases of beer when their last grocery run only resulted in them agreeing that one pack would be adequate for the weekend, but as the credits swim languorously in front of his eyes, he realizes that by now, they certainly have no more alcohol left in the house. Drinking beer while watching a Disney movie is oddly gratifying and makes the thought of watching a corny romantic children's movie much more tolerable, and now as Jensen tries to push himself from the cushions and musters up no coordination or strength necessary to complete such a task, he wishes he had consumed a few bottles less.  
  
"Goddamn great movie," he slurs instead, slumping onto the sofa and letting his chin rest on his chest.  
  
"Told you," Jared says, voice honeyed and thick with the undercurrent of his sleepy Texan accent. It only makes itself apparent when he's sluggish from sleep or tipsy from too many shots, which, as Jensen looks over and spots Jared's eyelids resting at half mast and foggy with a film of incoherency that can only be attributed to a lack of awareness that works alongside with the effects of liquor, realizes has definitely victimized his friend.  
  
"You're drunk, dude," Jensen says, and feels the need to poke Jared in the dimples itch at him once more. He indulges in himself and pokes. Jared giggles like the Pillsbury Dough Boy, and suddenly, Jensen feels like he's sixteen again and watching _Beauty and the Beast_ with his sister, pulse fluttering against his collarbone when he sees a sliver of forbidden skin ride up a boy's chest in the locker room.  
  
"You're Rapunzel," Jared says, swatting at Jensen's prodding finger, turning on his side to stare at Jensen's face, eyes suddenly wide and awed. The gentle light from the television licks up the left hemisphere of Jared's face, outlining the strong curve of his jaw and the shape of his cheekbones to leave apples of luminescence on the patches of his cheeks that protrude when he smiles, tongue pinned in between his teeth. His eyes are very green, speckled with mollifying yellows and hazels that shine in the darkling light that stretches gray past the midnight horizon.  
  
"I'm Rapunzel?" Jensen parrots, looking over at Jared.  
  
"Yeah. But you'll have to grow out your hair before I can climb it," Jared leans over to tug on Jensen's hair, fingers knotting into his short strands and pulling with surprising strength for someone with a habit to get clumsy when inebriated, a trait Jensen only learned of with experience and the history of many broken objects.  
  
"Get offa me, grabby hands," Jensen wrangles himself free from Jared's merciless yanks, petting at his hair before Jared slides his fingers into the bristles at the nape of his neck, this time gently and slowly to soothe the pain. "I thought you were Flynn."  
  
"I am, and you're Rapunzel," Jared says, hands still in Jensen's hair. They feel like warm patches of soft heat, like trickles of a shower's hot spray after a tightly strung day wearing on Jensen's muscles, and when his fingertips start massaging and rubbing at Jensen's scalp, he tries not to whimper and loll into his touch.  
  
"Why am I a girl?"  
  
"Ask yourself that, Ackles," Jared murmurs on a chortle, fisting his knuckles in Jensen's hair once more and scooting imperceptibly closer. Their feet are tangled at the ankles, something that must have occurred when Jared was singing along to _Something I Want_ near the finale of the movie, and suddenly the feel of Jared's legs pressed into his own feels too hot, like a burning flame licking up his thighs. "You're Rapunzel." Jared repeats, and leans in to kiss him.  
  
Jensen very eloquently responds with a muffled cry of protest that is stifled on the pressure of Jared's lips. _Jared's lips_. They're fused on his own, except they're not dead center and Jared's nose is jammed into his own, and the longer the kiss continues for, the more Jensen smells the overwhelming odor of beer and bad decisions. He stares at Jared's closed eyes as Jared's free hand slaps onto his cheek in what was clearly meant to be a gentle stroke, instead managing to sting his cheekbones. Jensen's frozen to his core and finding his reaction time to be severely lacking in reflexive swiftness as the kiss continues like the slow crumbling of a building landing directly on his skull and he sits, unresponsive, to all of it, as if suddenly catatonic as his inebriated brain rapidly tries to sort through his shouts and make sense of the fact that this _best friend's mouth is on his own_. And then, suddenly, Jared's tongue laps over Jensen's chin, catching the rough bristles of his evening stubble, and with his attempt to deepen the kiss stomped into the ground, reality snaps back into place like glass hitting the floor and shattering into broken shards. Jared jerks back.  
  
Jared's saliva is drying on his jaw and his lips are tingling with the phantom sensation of insistent lips rubbing against his own. He looks at Jared, officially drained of a vocabulary that would be adequate in a situation so incredibly cumbersome it's almost like there's a gun digging into his ribcage, and watches Jared's incredulous expression with an equally speechless countenance.  
  
"Fuck," Jared whispers, eyes even greener than before, and promptly twists off sofa, knocking their intermingled ankles together and vomiting gracefully on the rug.  
  
This, Jensen thinks, is not what is supposed to happen after watching Disney movies.  
  
Jared slurs curse words into his puddle of bubbling stomach acid and rancid chunks of pizza soaking into the carpet. The foul stench of digested dinner regurgitated over the floor assaults Jensen's nostrils, and when Jared finds the sober, dormant part of himself that harbors enough balance to pick himself off the floor and send himself careening into the bathroom to finish the emptying of the trembling beer pool of his stomach into the toilet, Jensen catches sight of his sick-slicked lips shining with saliva and bits of processed pepperoni and remembers that a mere moment ago, those lips were puckered against his own.  
  
Jensen listens to the sound of Jared noisily retching in the bathroom and feels his own stomach begin to gurgle as the sick threatens to climb up his throat as well.  
  
\---  
  
The next morning, is, without fail, incredibly awkward. Jensen wakes up, blinks vestiges of drunken sleep from his eyes as he pries his eyelids open to face the harsh morning light, swallows down the construction site drilling through his mind on a dry tongue, and is flooded with memories of sleek, animated blond hair, Jared's wet mouth, and a puddle of lumpy vomit bubbling by the couch as Jared's head of unruly hair deposited digested pizza onto the floor as it spilled from his throat.  
  
 _Well_ , Jensen thinks, hand shielding his burning retinas from the relentless sunlight, _shit_.  
  
Peeling himself out of bed and finding the center of his balance on his feet is a feat that pales in comparison to the cumbersome walk down to the stairs to the kitchen. Jared is sitting hunched on the kitchen counter, face buried in a coffee mug large enough to shield his entire face from the world as the epitome of the remorseful morning after picture.  
  
"Morning," Jensen grits out. He doesn't exactly want to start conversation, partly because his throat is like sandpaper and partly because he knows that a discussion with Jared will inevitably lead to a cumbersome moment of dancing around words while one of them tries to awkwardly address last night's events and either take the blame, apologize, or dismiss the entire evening with a few uncomfortable albeit manly claps on the back to confirm the fact that their friendship still stands despite last night's disturbing encounter.  
  
"Mornin'," Jared replies, tracing the rim of his coffee cup with his thumb. His eyes flit over to Jensen and return to the cup. As a man who isn't afraid to overuse eye contact, Jensen is slightly concerned. He feels like he should be reassuring Jared that everything's all right even if Jensen's stomach is still churning with unshed vomit at the memory of last night.  
  
"Uh," Jensen starts, reaching for his own mug from the dish rack and pouring in the remainder of the tepid pot of coffee, "How's your head?"  
  
"Took some painkillers," Jared says. He catches Jensen's eyes again, nothing but a mere a quick and awkward glance, and sighs as he sets his cup down. "About last night—"  
  
"Forget about it," Jensen dismisses as swiftly as he can without seeming touchy about the subject. He swirls around his coffee cup. He's managed to catch the dredges at the bottom of the pot, now floating as muddy globs in the midst of his fluid caffeine.  
  
"Um. I mean. Maybe I should explain—"  
  
"It didn't mean anything, so it's fine," Jensen tells him. He dumps the coffee in the sink without a single taste and deems the morning to be the precursor to an inevitably doomed day of awkward encounters and inedible food.  
  
"Jensen?"  
  
"Yeah?"  
  
"Are you okay?"  
  
Jensen stares at his grounds of coffee clumping in the sink disposal and looks back at Jared's concerned face. He's worried, which makes the situation that much worse for Jensen to endure, mostly because Jared is the one person who can't fix it but rather seems to be the original cause of the whole debacle.  
  
"I'm fine. Just need some breakfast in me to get rid of this goddamn headache." Jensen rubs at his temples and catches sight of a collection of beer bottles still strewn about the living room floor. Jared's vomit, he's glad to see, has been removed from the floor, whether it was the work of Jared's dogs finding it digestible in the middle of the night or Jared's hasty attempt to remove any evidence that might remind either of them of their beer-hazed kiss, Jensen doesn't even want to know. He sets his soiled mug back into the dishwasher and spends the entire afternoon holed up in his room reading over next week's script and trying valiantly to use it as a distraction.  
  
Instead of distracting him, Jensen falls asleep with crinkled papers in his left hand, half-eaten sandwich in his right hand, and his head cocooned against his pillow right when Jared's calling him downstairs for dinner.  
  
\---  
  
When Jensen awakens, it's to the gentle tune of Arabian music softly playing and the smell of rice tickling his nose. Oddly enough, the scent is warm and tasty, unlike what odorous stinks usually assault Jensen's nose when he's subject to Jared's cooking. He shifts on his bed and realizes that he's not on a bed at all, but rather a plush blue couch adorned with a silky satin throw, and then, that there is a tiger lounging gracefully three feet away.  
  
Jensen's first instinct is to scream, scream for Jared to take this animal back to the zoo or to take poor Harley out of the embarrassing costume, but before he can manage to vocalize such urgent pleas, the tiger yawns, showcasing an even set of sharp teeth, and blinks up at him in warm brown eyes.  
  
Jensen tries to find purchase on the sofa armrest, hands digging into soft, velvety cushions. That's not right either. His couch is lumpy and still smells vaguely of cheese from when Jared's botched fondue attempt spilled into the crevices of the couch and turned into an all night cleaning session complete with the steamer Jensen's mother took the liberty to send to him a few months earlier. This sofa is plush, soft, smooth when he runs his fingers over the upholstery.  
  
"JARED!" Jensen bellows, snapping his eyes shut and refusing to take in more of these bizarre, psychedelic oddities that are surrounding him. He wonders, briefly, if he's still drunk, still asleep, or someone felt permitted to spike his dinner with a cocktail of illegal drugs that now have him seeing tigers.  
  
Jared does not come to the rescue. Instead, the tiger shuffles forward. A giant paw comes out of nowhere and lands gingerly on Jensen's thigh. The tiger's claws are long and sharp, but the pads of his paw are tender and soft on Jensen's pants. He looks at the tiger incredulously and finds an expression of mollifying consolidation etched over its furry features. It whines.  
  
It's then when Jensen realizes that he's wearing a baggy pair of satin, light blue pants that are so exotic and silky he's positive they did not originate in his closet. His vest, an equal shade of chipper blue, covers little of his chest and caresses his torso in a way only the finest of silk could manage.  
  
He looks up from his glamorous pants and realizes that aside from the comforting smell of spicy rice, the tiger, the pants, and the couch, he also appears to be in an entirely different house. He fell asleep on the bedraggled mess of his sheets he hadn't bothered to tidy in the morning, stomach whining with the upset of too much snacking before bed, and he by no means remembers sleep walking to Agrabah in the meantime.  
  
 _Agrabah_ , Jensen thinks faintly. His memory is sparked with the sounds of Robin Williams' colorful voice wafting through the wall separating his and his sister's room and Mackenzie going through a brief phase in which she begged their parents to plan a vacation including an Arabian street market. He looks around the room, walls layered with elegant green curtains, the tables wrapped in golden tablecloths that hum around the floor, intricate rugs tickling Jensen's feet on the floor, and a shimmering curtain billowing gently with the warm nighttime breeze.  
  
"Oh my god," Jensen says feebly, brain wobbling as if floating along as a buoy in the ocean and getting vaguely seasick in response, "This is _Aladdin_."  
  
"Prince Jensen!" A voice calls, wafting through the fluttering curtain, and Jensen peers through the shimmery material as his eyes fall upon the blurry outline of a tall, male figure climbing up the balcony.  
  
"I'm _Jasmine_ ," Jensen repeats, and the tiger whines once more in support.  
  
"Prince Jensen!" The voice calls again, and Jensen feels the need to send away the disturbance that only continues to add to the eccentric freakishness that is this entire evening. He pushes himself from the couch, steps a large circle around the tiger rubbing against the carpet, and sticks his head out the glossy curtains leading to the patio.  
  
"Oh god," Jensen bemoans, and tries not to pitch himself off the patio.  
  
This is all so very wrong, so far from reality that Jensen aches to return to his normal life where he isn't a Disney character living his life as Arabian royalty. And if he's Jasmine, then Jared's—  
  
"It's me, Prince Jared Padalecki!" Jared announces from atop the railing, jumping to the patio with a flourish. He's wearing an ivory turban, for goodness sake's, adorned with a skinny feather and shimmery jewels. He looks lanky and out of place in his billowing pants and garish headpiece, and that's when Jensen remembers that in the movie, Prince Ali was nothing more than a street rat hoping to seduce the elegant Princess Jasmine.  
  
"Oh god, go away," Jensen whines, and shuts the curtains. They do little to distance him from Jared, who through the translucent drapes, looks crestfallen.  
  
"No, no, please, Prince! Please listen to me!"  
  
Jensen's dependable tiger prowls to its feet and crawls under the hem of the curtain to deliver a few throaty growls that sound eerily similar to Chris' voice after a concert of rigorous singing for an eager crowd. He watches as the tiger stalks toward Jared with rippling shoulders that do an adequate job of intimidating the man and sending him scrambling up the patio rail once more. He yanks his turban from his head and waves it over the tiger's head like he's offering fresh slabs of meat. It's oddly endearing, and Jensen finds himself watching him with chuckles itching at his throat that always threaten to spill from his throat whenever Jared does something particularly rib-tickling or rolls around on the floor with his dogs like a fellow canine.  
  
"See? I'm not just a prince," Jared says, acutely aware of the laughter tickling Jensen's tongue, who promptly rolls his lips into his mouth, "I'm funny, too."  
  
The tiger sends him a cynical look. It's surreal. Jensen's been to the zoo, and the most complex expression any animals have ever displayed in front of gawking humans has been utter indifference. This tiger is apparently the exception. Jensen takes it all in stride with the rest of the bizarre encounters currently thoroughly teasing his brain.  
  
"Are you trying to woo me?" Jensen realizes, and Jared colors pink. It's adorable how desperately he's attempting to be a charming prince that fits the bill of being both suave with his attitude, graceful with his movements, and sophisticated with his charisma. Jared does fine on his own with his energetic laughter and toothy grin without moonlighting as a prince.  
  
"Why, is it working?" Jared says, grinning and leaning on the railing. The turban slides down his forehead and threatens to slip over his eyes. When Jensen chortles at his lack of eloquence, Jared's face falls. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't be trying to woo you like you're some prize to be won. I'll… I'll go."  
  
Jensen doesn't remember exactly what happens in Aladdin with the exception that there was a genie and a triumphant ending complete with sugary romance, but he's almost positive the original script never involved suicide, which is what he's currently witnessing as Jared crawls on top of the railing and takes a dramatic leap forward.  
  
"Jared!" Jensen shouts, and rushes forward to the railing with his tiger in tow. He takes a deep breath, clenches his fists around the railing in desperate hope that he isn't going to find a bloody mass of Jared's mangled limbs pooling on the ground below, confirming that Jensen actually _can_ ruin a Disney classic with his pessimism, and peers over the edge.  
  
His heart slides back out of his throat when he sees Jared sitting innocently on a carpet bobbing along the air as if kept there by an invisible force capable of defying gravity. The carpet glides up smoothly to brush against the tip of the railing. That's when Jensen's memory clicks into place and once more supplies him with recollections of the magic carpet that is the precursor to a moonlit ride through the sky examining shimmering constellations, and then, vocalizing all of their thoughts of the dazzling stars and velvety expanse of the sky through a song.  
  
Jared navigates the carpet to glide over the patio. It's intricate, soft under Jensen's fingers when he reaches out to stroke the tassels hanging from the corners, and above all, undoubtedly magical. Jensen blinks hard. When he opens his eyes, there's still a carpet swaying gently in front of him, Jared crawling forward to scoot closer to Jensen.  
  
"It's a magic carpet," he whispers, as if sharing a secret, "You don't want to go on a ride, do you? We could get away from the palace? See the world?"  
  
"This can't be real," Jensen protests adamantly, still stroking the carpet. He works daily on the set of a show revolving around paranormal occurrences and supernatural activity, but never before has evidence confirming the existence of the supernatural in reality sprung up under his nose like this before.  
  
Then he remembers he's in a Disney movie trapped as Princess Jasmine, looks down at his billowing blue pants, and back up to Jared's expectant smile.  
  
"Do you trust me?" Jared asks, extending a broad hand. Jensen's heart swells. Even in an alternate universe such as the bizarre world of Aladdin, Jensen still feels like he's looking at his gawky best friend. After a few years of learning how to read each other's every emotion, spending every waking minute running lines, drinking beer, and filming the show, and intuitively being aware of one another's thought process, Jensen trusts him fiercely. He looks at Jared's outstretched hand and his broad grin.  
  
"Yes," Jensen says, and it feels like a death wish coming out of his mouth. He grabs Jared's hand, clambers onto the carpet, and almost instantly, feels it soar into the sky so swiftly he almost topples backward, Jared's strong arm winding around his waist keeping him steady as they ascend into the sky. A soft wind combs through Jensen's hair as stars seem to barely graze him by and underneath him, the lights and round domes of the roofs and city below him are almost startling to see when he's not lodged in a plane to Vancouver at the window seat feeling groggy and feebly ill with Jared playing Tetris in the seat next to him.  
  
A warm mouth presses gently into the curve of his ear as the strong hand firmly wrapped around his waist squeezes his hip and tucks Jensen into the curve of his side, "I can show you the world," Jared whispers, voice gentle and honeyed as he murmurs in Jensen's ear, "Shining, shimmering, splendid."  
  
A gentle shiver courses through Jensen's bones as Jared sings into his ear, soft and slow, and as he stares down at the lakes and towns they're soaring over, he starts to understand why Disney princesses are always so love struck after performing ballads with their princes. A soft thumb brushes over his chin until Jensen turns to face the origin of the caress and finds Jared smiling fondly, less than an inch and two seconds away from his face, while he shrinks the distance separating them down to nothing.  
  
Jensen sucks in a shaky breath moments before Jared's lips, soft, ginger, and tasting of curry rice and Arabian spices, press against his own.  
  
Then Jensen's thighs are warm and wet, and that's when he wakes up to the feel of sticky, come-slicked sheets sliding against his legs while he drools into the pillow.  
  
 _A dream,_ Jensen thinks breathlessly, shifting his thighs and grimacing at the feel of rapidly cooling come beginning to crust on his thighs as he throws off the covers, dries his thighs, and promptly deposits his soiled sheets into the washing machine to cleanse off the memories of his Disney nightmare with a quick spin of three a.m. laundry.  
  
\---  
  
It's long after his washing cycle is done ridding his bedspread of evidence of his horrifying dream when Jensen allows himself to fall asleep again on his bed, sans the sheets, for another few restless hours of slumber before morning awakens him. He hangs his sheets up on his shower rod to dry while he sleeps atop his bare mattress until a few invasive rays of sunlight filtering through his window wakes him up from his thankfully dreamless second slumber. He rubs the sleep from his eyes, checks to reassure himself that he's woken up in his own house far away from magical cities of Agrabah, and stumbles into the bathroom only to find Jared, towel slung low over his damp hips and turban curved atop his head.  
  
"Oh god," Jensen says, "Is that a—"  
  
Jared's head snaps up, strands of hair peeking out from underneath a towel twisted shapelessly around his wet mop of hair. Jensen is immensely glad to see that it isn't a turban. He exhales in relief at the fact that he's still lodged in a safe reality where there are no magic carpets or romantic rendezvous. He then rapidly makes the realization that he's in a bathroom with Jared while he's bare in nothing but a towel held up by his hipbones, canal of his chest damp and forehead dripping with cool beads sliding down from his hair. It's like something out of a pornography Misha might send him for giggles.  
  
"Jensen," Jared says, hand fisting around his towel to assure it won't be slipping from his hips and causing more mayhem than what already exists. Jensen already knows what it's like to have his best friend's tongue lick over his face; he's almost positive that if he were to catch a glimpse of Jared's favorite body part he might be inclined to resort to suicide. "Do you need something?"  
  
"Didn't hear the water run," Jensen says, trying hard to stare at anything that isn't Jared's defined abdomen muscles or toned calves. He stares at his hair towel. It still looks like a turban. "Didn't know you were in here. Showering."  
  
"Oh. You okay?" Jared asks. He takes a step closer to Jensen and Jensen almost trips over his feet taking a sizable step back. He tells himself to get a grip. He's a grown man who's not afraid of cooties anymore, and kiss or no kiss, Jared is still his best friend who Jensen has seen plenty of times scantily clad on accident simply because those incidents occur after living in each other's pocket for a few years. Jensen tries not to think about the magic carpet ride where Jared hooked their fingers together and sang in his ear. Jensen tells himself that were any of that real, Jared's horrendous singing would have ruined the moment before it would have had any opportunity to make Jensen swoon.  
  
"Yeah," Jensen says, and reaches for the door handle, "I should go."  
  
"Jensen, wait," Jared says, reaching out with his occupied hand and almost resulting in a dangerous slip of his towel, "Maybe we should talk about—"  
  
Jensen worms out of the bathroom and slams the door shut. "Sorry!" he calls through the door. "We can talk later!"  
  
 _When I can't see the bulge of Satan's shovel through your towel,_ Jensen adds mentally, and runs downstairs so fast he almost trips gracelessly down the stairs. He grabs his coat, his keys, and doesn't bother to put on pants he didn't sleep in before he drives to the nearest Waffle House and stays there digesting breakfast all the way until lunch.  
  
At night, he steers clear of the greasy snack foods, avoids the tempting bowl of chips sitting on the coffee table, and doesn't let himself watch any questionable television before he goes to bed. He snuggles into his sheets, presses his face into the pillow, and tries very hard to focus solely on innocuous and banal thoughts like how long filming will take on Monday and how he plans on eating pancakes tomorrow for breakfast.  
  
It takes him three hours and twenty-seven minutes to finally persuade his mind into sleeping, and by then it's an uneasy slumber at best, full of distant singing playing on repeat through his mind like a scratchy record.  
  
\---  
  
When Jensen wakes up, his first assumption is that he's overslept horribly. His hair feels like it hasn't been washed in weeks, his jaw rough with unshaven stubbles, and he isn't overhearing the routine sounds of the morning of Jared the clinking and clanking with the dishes as he  attempts to create breakfast.  
  
Jensen opens his eyes. This, he realizes, is not reality.  
  
He's sitting, crouched in warrior position, on a rock perched between a collection of unkempt bushes and a lake gently misted by a waterfall pitter-pattering into the pond underneath it. It's the middle of uncultivated nature, free of the destructive imprint of man, and that's when Jensen realizes that something is wrong.  
  
Through the mist of the waterfall, a figure clutching a weapon in the form of a clunky gun blends into the bushes on the opposite side of the stream, eclipsed by the dim light of the dusk settling over the land. There's a disturbance amid the beauty, human interference among the native plants and trees surviving for centuries among the earthy soil and untouched waters, and Jensen feels the strong urge to protect his habitat course through his veins. A gentle rustle of greenery startles him and has him reflexively reaching for the leather pocket of handmade arrows slung over his bank. Jensen takes a moment to rewind.  
  
His hands search down the length of his spine until the sharp point of a freshly made arrow pokes him in the palm. He hisses and draws his hand back, eyes peering over his shoulder to catch a glimpse of the peaks of three crudely crafted arrowheads sticking out from the pouch resting against his backside.  
  
That's when he notices his hair. It's longer than usual, curling by his ear, kissed by the sun into a lighter hue than normal, scraggly and matted when Jensen rubs it in between his forefinger and thumb. His hands are rougher, calloused on the palms and crusted with dirt and blood at the knuckles. On his forearm, a dark brown tattoo curls around his arm. It furls around his flesh in soft, natural curls that resemble the rush of an ocean's waves, and when Jensen examines it, it looks vaguely synonymous with a trademark pattern gangs might use to differentiate themselves from neighboring cults.  
  
Past the stream, the foliage rustles once again. Jensen perks up. His perplexity at his new caveman-esque lifestyle is momentarily forgotten as his human impulses take charge and overwhelms his need to decipher the meaning of his dream. His legs don't let him stop and ruminate, however, propelling him past the stream as he dexterously dances past the rush of the stream, leaping from protruding rocks to halcyon jets of water caressing his muddy feet, overused and bruised at the sole. He crosses the river, pulse pounding against the vein of his neck as he follows the lengthy footprints of his land's intruder, as if tracking a criminal or locating a trespasser.  
  
Jensen peers between the stalks of a verdant plant growing in the middle of the path. In between his ankles, a raccoon slinks alongside Jensen's footsteps, tail dripping from where it dipped into the stream when it followed Jensen. It reminds Jensen of his tiger accomplice, a loyal sidekick following him through  an adventure, and Jensen can't bring himself to shut his eyes, count to ten, and run away from the potentially aggressive animal like a frightened piece of prey.  
  
A drive much stronger than his internal fear encourages him to follow the muddy footprints in the path, eyes zipping along the impressions of shoes as his feet carry him faster, closer to the prowler of Jensen's territory, when suddenly, a tree overhead shakes and a six foot tall man comes leaping from the lowest branch into Jensen's way.  
  
Jensen's first impulse is to scream. He can feel the scared little girl running in frantic circles inside his ribcage, but despite the jolt of fright that alarms Jensen's body, he holds his ground and doesn't allow his mouth to utter a sound, even upon the dreadful realization that he's staring down the barrel of a gun brushing the tip of his nose. A pit of consternation forms in Jensen's stomach even though he intuitively knows that his fingers are more nimble, reflexes more rapid, and arrows more precise than this unreliable technology. He meets the eyes at the bottom of the gun, bright green and wide in astonishment, and slowly, he lowers the gun.  
  
"You, again," Jensen murmurs under his breath and rolls his eyes as he catches sight of Jared, equally gruff in his appearance. He thought he'd kicked the habit of permitting Jared to worm into his dreams after the horrendous incident that was the Aladdin catastrophe of last night. This Jared, however, is not an accurate depiction of the current version. He looks rougher around the edges, as if accustomed to living on scarce resources and in brutal conditions, facial hair scruffy on his jaw and brown hair flowing past his ear, long overdue for a haircut. Jensen resists the urge to reach out and feel it in his fingers, especially when Jared's equipped with a gun.  
  
"It's okay," Jared tells him, lowering the gun, but oddly enough, Jensen's brain doesn't comprehend the words. They don't process correctly, only vaguely familiar to him, as if the words are in an exotic language he can't understand. He tries to understand, and Jared seems to catch onto his bewilderment. He puts the gun on the soft earth beneath them and raises his hands, defenseless to the pack of arrows peeking out over Jensen's shoulders, and tries to earn Jensen's trust with a genuine smile that pierces through Jensen no matter how little he understands of his words.  
  
There's something very frustrating about not speaking the same language as Jared. Jensen encounters it almost every day in his life when he tries to decode infamous Padalecki-isms and Jarednese that only after years of spending time alongside Jared almost constantly has Jensen become fluent in, but this is different than just translating Jared's eccentric vocabulary; it's a whole language separating them. What's more frustrating, however, is not being able to tell Jared that this is all _nonsense_. He knows this is a dream. It's vivid and hardly blurry around the edges, so real Jensen feels every twitch and emotion wrack his bones, but there's something surreal in the air. Something familiar, like Jensen's seen it all before.  
  
"My name," Jared says slowly, articulating his words with innocuous gestures to help Jensen understand, "is Jared Padalecki."  
  
 _John Smith_ , Jensen's mind helpfully suggests, and then he makes the connection, which is an appalling one.  
  
He's seen it all before on his _television_. It's another Disney movie. Another Disney movie with animated people, culturally relevant settings, and guaranteed fluffy endings. Promised romance that will melt the hearts of all humans who own them. Strangers meeting in unconventional circumstances, fireworks sparking and love blossoming, obstacles being surpassed and love conquering all. Plus, furry sidekicks. Jensen sneaks a glance at the raccoon at his feet. It sends him a wink.  
  
"I'm Jensen," Jensen says, and Jared seems to understand despite the language barrier separating their communication. Jared's hand, just as calloused as Jensen's trained hunter hands— _Pocahontas_ hands, Jensen reminds himself miserably—extends into an expectant handshake. Jensen looks down at his outstretched hand, and for a second, even the concept of a simple, banal handshake seems foreign. He catches Jared's eyes, warm, trusting, and innocent in intent as the gun rests motionlessly between their feet, and Jensen reaches out to slide his fingers into his.  
  
It is, quite simply, like a moment lost in time, like in the movies when slow motion puts a brake on the clocks as two people lock gazes and share pasts all in the blink of an eye. The wind picks up, brushing leaves from the ground and gliding them in a smooth circle around their bodies, intertwined at the hands, and Jensen would be inclined to believe it was a coincidence if he didn't remember that he's trapped inside a Disney movie, where all mysterious gusts of wind have meaning hidden in the breeze.  
  
The handshake goes on longer than necessary, as if their fingers are fused together. Jared looks transfixed at the sight of Jensen's face, tanned from the sun, freckled at the cheeks, smeared with dirt at the left temple. Comparing Jensen's ratty handmade clothes to Jared's tailored pants is already a stark contrast, and Jensen can only imagine how different their pasts, cultures, and families are in this dream.  
  
Before he gets the chance to find out, however, the handshake ends, Jared pulls away his warm, comforting grip and Jensen snaps back into consciousness.  
  
\---  
  
Jensen wakes up to Jared looming over his bed after he slept through his alarm alerting him to get dressed for work and swallow down a frozen waffle, and his hair looks so unreasonably long from this angle Jensen's first deduction is that he's landed directly in _Beauty and the Beast_.  
  
Turns out, Jared just needs a haircut.  
  
\---  
  
When Jensen's next dream manifests, all he realizes is that his knees ache.  
  
They ache like he's been walking on them for days without any aid from his feet, using his kneecaps as roller skates and carving stones. His hands are soapy, his fingers are pruned, and his knuckles are scuffed from overuse, and never before has Jensen's body felt so overworked, including fifteen-hour filming days with nothing but a thirty-minute nap in his trailer and wolfing down a snack while his make-up is refreshed.  
  
He blinks the exhaustion from his eyes even though it clings to his eyelids and tugs them down with a force stronger than gravity, his head swimming with the idea of putting down the goddamn sponge.  
  
Sponge?  
  
Jensen blinks away the last vestiges of slumber from his eyes and focuses on the blurry world in front of him coming into focus. He's on knees on a cold hardwood floor beside a grimy bucket filled with sloshing soapy water, and in his hand is a sopping sponge wrinkling his palm. His pants have spots of dirt and his shirt is a hand-me-down that is too tight on Jensen's arms, defined after hours spent mopping kitchen floors.  
  
He thought after years of living with Jared Padalecki, he'd done his fair share of honest labor, but apparently his unconscious mind still feels the need to transport him into a dreamscape where he switches roles with a maid.  
  
Of course, it isn't that simple.  
  
Heated voices, muffled through the door, approach the kitchen, and Jensen sits up and cracks his sore back as the door opens to Tom Welling and Mike Rosenbaum, both wearing hideous tuxedos in dashing shades of orange and green complete with lacy ruffles and frilly coattails, storming into the kitchen in the midst of a frenzied quarrel. Jensen refrains from laughing, but the sound still traitorously creeps from his throat and slips from his mouth in a poorly stifled snicker. Tom and Mike both fix Jensen with ominously grim expressions that after spending a fair deal of time working with these two pranksters on Smallville, Jensen has never witnessed on their faces before. It manages to immediately quiet him, and for a moment, Jensen wonders when Tom and Mike became intimidating, especially while donning crazy facsimiles of suits.  
  
"Aren't you supposed to be working?" Tom says, rather snidely, and Mike joins in on the scowling in Jensen's general direction with a sneer that curls his lip. It doesn't suit his face. Jensen, used to seeing nothing but roaring laughter escape from Mike's mouth, doesn't know whether to cower or chuckle at the sight of such a sincere snarl on Mike Rosenbaum's typically kind face.  
  
"Father said you can't go the ball if you don't finish your chores." Mike feels the need to point out, straightening the ruffle of his vest. It does little to help, and Jensen refrains from pointing his opinion regarding Tom and Mike's matching horrendous outfits out to both men, especially when his brain interrupts his thoughts with a mind-boggling epiphany.  
  
He's not a maid, a butler, or even just the average victimized employer. He's Cinderella, sans the ratty dress and apron, and he's staring at his ugly step-sisters turned goofball step-brothers wearing remarkably stern expressions.  
  
Jensen doesn't remember seeing Cinderella. As far as he is aware, it's one of the older films Disney created, left to myth and a number of horrifying remakes that Jensen all avoids like the plague when he spares a moment at home to flip through the channels on Friday nights and finds Chad Michael Murray attempting to seduce Hilary Duff on the Disney Channel, a scene that amuses Jared to no end and always results in a phone call to Chad mocking him well past midnight.  
  
Once again, Jensen feels the need to laugh, but the situation is significantly too serious to consider breaking with light-hearted chortles, so Jensen gets to his feet, hears his knees crackle, and dumps the sponge back into the murky bucket of wash water.  
  
"Not like he's even going," says Tom, much like an elementary school bully might taunt a girl with glasses, "Look at what he's wearing."  
  
Tom and Mike guffaw like horses. It is surreal. Jensen wants desperately to smack them both over the head. It's one thing to be stuck in female roles as a male counterpart replica, but it's another to be taunted by his friends whom Jensen has very vivid memories of watching sing karaoke from _Moulin Rouge_ atop his kitchenette into an empty tube of toothpaste helpfully found in the trash while thoroughly intoxicated off of hard liquor, possibly expired, found in Jared's cabinets.  
  
"Yeah, Tom, Mike?" Jensen says, drying his hands on his pants, "I'm not your damn maid. This is ridiculous." He considers the idea of tossing the soaking sponge directly at Mike's polka dot bowtie and musters up years worth of maturity to stop himself from giving into such a mad desire. He wonders if he will ever see Tom and Mike again the same after this dream, or more importantly, if he'll ever again dream of anything that wasn't funded by Walt Disney.  
  
That's when he realizes that he hasn't seen Jared yet. Disney and Jared and Jensen generally being an attractive young girl have been the recurring themes for the past few days, yet Jared is mysteriously absent from the musty kitchen Jensen's currently finished polishing the floors of.  
  
Tom and Mike scoff in unison at Jensen's defiance. Their synchronized bitchiness is something Jensen knows he won't be able to last a whole dream through without throwing them both bodily into a lockable closet and swallowing the key, so he simply rolls his eyes and opts for turning wordlessly away.  
  
"Good luck scoring the Prince with that attitude at the ball," Mike says, "Especially in those pants. They're not helping anybody."  
  
Tom whispers conspiratorially into Mike's ear. They snigger like Disney villains, which, Jensen realizes, they are, and greet Jensen with matching grins that Jensen wouldn't trust in a million years a second time after agreeing to swallow raw wasabi the last time he was manipulated by those dangerous Cheshire grins.  
  
"Jensen," Tom says, carefully articulating his words as he tries hard not to let a scheming smile overwhelm his entire face, and Jensen feels like he's back on Smallville three seconds away from getting epically pranked, "How about you come with us to the ball? It would be fun."  
  
"Or _funny_ ," Mike whispers, eliciting a snicker from Tom, like Jensen can't hear every word of their poorly hushed teasing.  
  
"I used to like you guys," Jensen says morosely, "I'm definitely not going."  
  
Both men huff and mutter like boys denied candy before dinner and thunder from the kitchen. Jensen stares at the countertops, replicas of the mess often found in college dorms, ranging from empty bags of popcorn to crusty bowls of expired milk and cereal. The Tom and Mike in Jensen's special Cinderella hell being complete slobs puts the cherry on the sundae. Vaguely, he wonders if Tom and Mike have such horrendous eating habits in reality as well, and Jensen makes a mental note to ask when he wakes up.  
  
"No way in hell am I doing all of this work." Jensen says directly to the plates. The plates stare at him like they're challenging him to come and wash them. Jensen snarls.  
  
"Don't be like that, Jensen." A voice out of nowhere speaks up, and Jensen turns around prepared to be met with talking, life-sized mice.  
  
Instead, he sees Danneel, floating in midair. It's one of the eeriest things Jensen's ever seen, even after working on a set where the majority of all actors on set wear make-up that models them to look like corpses freshly dug from their graves. She's wearing what is most likely a hoop skirt held in place by multiple metal rings, a corset that restricts all lung capacity, and shiny blue slippers that hang underneath her as she bobs around the air like a buoy in sea. Her hair is curled in tight ringlets falling over her shoulder and if Jensen walked around her, he's almost positive he'd find a miniature pair of feathery wings by her spine.  
  
"Danneel," Jensen says, afraid to blink and find that Danneel is not the only floating fairy obscuring the details of this dream.  
  
"Jensen, just because Tom and Mike want to take you with them to laugh at your apron doesn't mean going to the ball is a bad idea," she says, like she's talking to a five-year-old, and Jensen tries hard to focus on her face when her entire body is floating as if suspended by strings, "Don't you know who will be there?"  
  
"No," he confesses, "Oh shit, Jared."  
  
"You're an idiot," Danneel says, surprisingly fondly, and bobs closer, "How are you supposed to have Prince Jared fall in love with you if you don't show up?"  
  
"But I don't want Jared to fall in love with me," Jensen says, "Wait. _Prince_?"  
  
"Yes you do," Danneel says, tweaking his nose with one of her small fingers and conveniently ignoring his puzzlement at Jared's royal status, officially making Jensen the girl once again if Jared's the story's prince, "When are you going to realize it? Honestly, if you didn't have me, you'd never get anything done, Jensen."  
  
"But that kiss," Jensen protests dumbly, "it didn't mean anything. I'm not in love with Jared and Jared's not supposed to be in love with me."  
  
Danneel ignores him, procures a pair of shiny black dancing shoes out of thin air, and dangles them in front of Jensen's face. The insides are scuffed at the sole and some of the leather has wrinkled at the toe, but they're timeless and something about them draws Jensen to them instantly.  
  
"Your father's," Danneel says softly, placing them in his palm, "You'd look great wearing them."  
  
Jensen looks down at the shoes in his palm. They're the cleanest thing in this whole room, sparkling from where Danneel must have polished them before presenting them to Jensen. He slides the pad of his thumb over the gloss at the toe and smiles. When he was eight, his father tried to teach him how to foxtrot so he could impress his lady on his wedding night and pulled out shoes just like these from the musty attic in his childhood Texan home to demonstrate. Danneel _awwww_ s in the background as she watches Jensen examine the shoes and he looks at her once more.  
  
"You want me to go to the ball," Jensen repeats slowly, "Wear these, and then dance with _Prince_ Jared Padalecki so we can fall in love?"  
  
"At least you're not a hopeless case," Danneel tilts her head and smiles, twirling a red curl around her finger as she watches Jensen shuck off his ratty sandals and slip into the dress shoes. They fit perfectly, of course, and look like masterpieces on his feet.  
  
"Even though I don't want to fall in love with Jared," Jensen says, waiting for the light of recognition to flash in Danneel's eyes so she can fully understand the situation and they can reevaluate the story, "You know that, right?"  
  
"No," Danneel says slowly, racking on several more _o_ s until Jensen feels sufficiently inferior to Danneel's omniscient wisdom and hard stare, "Haven't you ever seen Cinderella, Ackles? Cinderella isn't supposed to go through silly denial like this."  
  
"Cinderella's not supposed to be a _man_."  
  
Danneel puts a finger directly over Jensen's lips and shushes him, proceeding to fluff and fix Jensen's hair like she's his mother before prom night, "Thank goodness you have a fairy like me to help you out. Actually, _you're_ the fairy, Jensen. I take it back."  
  
"I hate you." Jensen mumbles, shuffling around the grimy kitchen floor in his glossy shoes.  
  
"I hate you too," Danneel tells him, patting his cheek and floating merrily around him to tuck in his shirt and smooth the wrinkles of his pants. "Now go upstairs and tell Tom and Mike that you're going with them and find yourself a prince."  
  
"Let me guess," Jensen says dryly, attempting to worm away from Danneel's invasive grooming simultaneously, "I have to be home by midnight."  
  
"So you did see Cinderella," she says with a pleased grin, "Yes. Midnight." She leans in, wetly kisses his cheek, and smooths back his hair. "Now _go_."  
  
Jensen looks down at the expanse of floor underneath him, more than half still unpolished, and shifts his throbbing knees. He has no desire to spend the entire evening in the presence of Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum plus their ostentatious outfits that could easily be their own entity, but weighing his options, Jensen also doesn't want to spend an evening cleaning their toilets.  
  
"Fine," Jensen acquiesces, and storms upstairs to find Tom and Mike cooing over the state of each other's hair, "I'll come," he tells them, "But don't expect me to wear a penguin suit matching yours in a shade of yellow. I'm wearing my own clothes."  
  
"Like we'd share our clothes!" Tom screeches, hands curling protectively around his lacy collar. Jensen still has trouble processing that Tom Welling and Mike Rosenbaum are walking around haughtily while donning flashy vests and mismatching bowties. He feels drunk. Mike snaps his fingers in front of him.  
  
"Let's get going!"  
  
The ride to the ball is nothing short of surreal. They bump and sway down pebbly roads situated in a wooden carriage run by lazy horses. This is no modern fairytale, Jensen thinks faintly, and desperately misses cars. He thinks of the plush leather seats and smooth engine he has tucked into the garage at home and is yanked roughly back to reality when the rickety carriage jerks them over a wayward rock protruding in the path. All the while, Mike and Tom say nothing to Jensen, staring as if thoroughly amused at his appearance and anticipating the laughter and ridicule that will follow him once they arrive at the ball. He's put on a clean pair of pants and rolled down the sleeves of his wrinkly button down, but compared to Tom and Mike's elaborate clothing, his own attire is seriously lacking in flamboyant accessories. Used to spending car rides with Tom and Mike where Tom's drunk off of champagne in the backseat while Mike sticks his head out of the sun roof, this stuffy silence is incredibly awkward. Jensen fiercely misses Jared in this dream.  
  
The carriage comes to a wobbly stop and the horses stomp their hooves restlessly as Tom and Mike smooth the creases from their jackets, step from their seats, and jump from the carriage while the hoary wooden wheels groan and creak. Jensen steps from the carriage and follows in Tom and Mike's footsteps as they cross the threshold to the mansion, soft violin music and boisterous laughter seeping through the cracks leading outdoors. Jensen has trouble believing his own brain came up with a setting this elaborate, the bushes intricately trimmed, the pebble walkway clean of muddy footprints, and the house itself reaching astronomical proportions. The paint isn't peeling and the grass is clipped, and when Jensen steps inside, he's met with a scene out of 1800s England.  
  
A long hallway, full of stomping and dancing couples twirling and weaving through each other, shines from the sheen of candlelit chandeliers shaking from the immense sound reverberating through the dance hall alone. A band equipped with violins and cellos inspires the dancers to continue skipping alongside the light-hearted atmosphere of the entire hall, and amidst the blur of the crowd, Jensen catches familiar faces like Sandy, brown locks gently curled on her shoulder, Kripke, conducting the instrumentalists, and Chris and Steve, busy cleaning the underside of their dancing shoes by the wall.  
  
"Prince Jared," Tom's voice breathes out in total awe next to him, and Jensen refocuses his attention to follow Tom's gaze straight onto the most breathtaking person in the room.  
  
Jensen feels a jolt of nearly illegal feelings of wonder and, dare he admit it—lust—course through his muscles at the sight. Of course Jared would be Prince Charming if Jensen is the hard-working Cinderella doomed to a life of unjust slavery to his diabolical step-brothers, and of course he would look unrealistically dashing while doing it. His hair is slicked from his face, a sleek dark brown contrast from his pale face highlighted by a clean-shaven jaw and bright eyes. Royalty has clearly been good to him, and donning his neatly tailored tuxedo and shiny shoes, Jensen can't help but wonder if Jared would manage to knock the wind from Jensen's lungs while he's conscious as well were he to comb his hair and put on a suit that flawlessly fits his freakishly tall body.  
  
Jensen doesn't realize he's been staring like a junior high girl memorizing the length of her crush's eyelashes while stuck in a boring history lesson when he blinks and notices that Jared is staring back at him. It's not a fleeting look, a brief instance of eye contact before continuing to rake a glance over the room, but instead, it's a lingering look that makes Jensen go vaguely weak in the knees. It's a little ridiculous, really, because he's not thirteen anymore, and he shouldn't get turned on from one direct look in his eyes from across the room, but suddenly his legs feel constricted in his pants and his pulse speeds up considerably when Jared locks their eyes and glues their gazes together like warm caramel.  
  
Two seconds later, Jared is approaching him, a rendition of an exquisite waltz starting up under Kripke's conduction, and that's when Jensen realizes that he's at a _ball_. There's dancing and music and most of all, Jensen's two left feet solidly planted on the dance floor, making him fair game for any lonely dancer looking for a good tango, including Jared, who is not the average shy wallflower looking for a twirl around the dance floor, but the town's best eligible prince, and if Tom's breathless gasps are any indication, the town's best stud as well.  
  
He barely has time to consider whirling around and hightailing back to the horses to hitch a ride back to reality, where no one asks him to waltz or scrub kitchen floors, when Jared takes the last swift step closer to Jensen's proximity and smiles with a set of dazzling teeth that causes Jensen to hear millions of enamored high school girls squeal and sigh far off in his mind.  
  
"Sir," Jared says, extending a hand, and Jensen has to refrain from laughing at such a formal greeting that Jared would rather chuck himself off of a rooftop than refer to Jensen as, "Would you consider having this dance with me?"  
  
Jensen looks at the proffered hand extended toward him and tries to pinpoint why his heartbeat's staccato tattoo against his chest is about to split his ribcage and his mind feels so woozy. He is, truly, a thirteen-year-old girl. Jensen is immensely glad that these dreams are privately locked in his own conscious, forever prisoners to his own mind only. He glances over to where some dancers have stopped to watch as Prince Jared approaches a commonplace civilian. Tom looks murderous. Mike looks mildly ill.  
  
"Uh," Jensen says eloquently, knowing that if he catches Jared's gaze he'll fall prey to Jared's well-honed liquid eyes modeled meticulously after a begging puppy's, "You might lose a few toes." He wishes he could say _you wouldn't be so eager to waltz with me if this was real life_ , but the comment stays unborn on his tongue.  
  
"Please?"  
  
Jensen meets his hopeful gaze. His arsenal of protests crumbles and he grabs his hand. "Just one," he says, and Jared grins like he's presented him with the sun in a box.  
  
"Just one," Jared agrees, and he wastes no time pulling Jensen out into the dance floor, where the crowd has obediently parted to make room like Jared can wordlessly control the whole room. Being a royal prince, living in a gargantuan mansion, and inheriting a king's fortune may entitle one to possessing enough power to effectively do so.  
  
The band's song seems to cater entirely to Jared's movements. Every high-pitched violin note and climatic cello solo appears to be harmonizing with Jared's feet, following his every move and surprisingly graceful turn. For a man who carries himself like an ape and hunks over Jensen like a caveman, hardly capable of controlling his massive limbs and lengthy figure, he dances like a well-trained ballerina who's practiced dance steps since youth. He grabs Jensen's waist in a firm grip and leads him so effortlessly Jensen has to do little but step with him and valiantly attempt to avoid stepping on his polished shoes. When he's not busy glancing repeatedly at the clumsy movements of his own feet, he's watching Jared's face as he observes Jensen. His green eyes are alight in the chandelier's radiance, glimmering with a Disney sparkle.  
  
"I saw you standing there," Jared says, pulling Jensen closer until their chests are brushing and their feet almost have no room left to dance, words blowing over his ear, "and couldn't help myself. You're breathtaking."  
  
"And this is coming from the finest prince in the land," Jensen says, and tries not to burst out laughing. He feels like he's back in eighth grade auditioning for Shakespeare, except this time he's in the play with Jared by his side causing general tomfoolery and somehow, managing to score a role as Jensen's royal love interest. Disney really is insane, Jensen thinks, as Jared twirls him in a quick circle and tucks him back into his side.  
  
"You could sweep the crown from my head any day," Jared says, fingertips brushing over Jensen's forehead and tracing a colony of freckles on his cheek. Jensen tries hard to understand why he's blushing. "What's your name?"  
  
"Jensen," he tells him. He wonders if there are going to be fireworks, or worse, applause, when the dance is complete.  
  
"Well, Jensen, my father has been bothering me about finding a partner all night long and for three hours I couldn't find a single person I wanted to pull out here to dance with me," Jared admits, low and quiet against Jensen's ear, "Until you showed up."  
  
"So you don't say that to all the boys?" Jensen says. He tries desperately to remain humorous and pleasantly sarcastic if only to mask how fast his heart is _ba-dump_ ing against his chest like he's a teenager in heat. Something about Jared, regal in clothes and majestic in title, has Jensen unequivocally captivated. He feels incredibly stupid. Danneel told him this would happen. Mentally, Jensen thanks his lucky stars that Jared isn't such a charismatic prince in real life, capable of charming Jensen stupid just by sweeping him in a few breathless circles.  
  
"No," Jared says, so sincere and earnest Jensen tries hard not to melt, and when he leans in and their noses brush, Jensen wishes he could run away to avoid the sickeningly sweet climax of their brushing lips. It's going to be the best kiss of Jensen's life, he intuitively knows this if Jared's soft pink lips are any indicator, and it's terrible that it happens to occur in Jensen's unconscious mind.  
  
 _No no no_ , Jensen thinks hopelessly as Jared twirls them in a graceful circle and Jensen's feet almost leave the floor for a few seconds, _this isn't even real. This is when I wake up and snap out of this ridiculousness._ And then, for good measure, he internally adds, _This is ridiculous._  
  
"Can I kiss you?" Jared whispers. Jensen swears he hears a tinge of Texas.  
  
He could shake his head, scream at the whole room, throw his antique shoes at Mike and Tom's heads, abandon cheesy Disney storylines altogether, and then proceed to dispose of Jared's Disney DVD collection in the garbage. He considers it, but it appears his time is up. Jared swoops in, uncaring of Jensen's response or potential rejection, and presses their lips together.  
  
There is a collective gasp that buzzes around the room and escapes from Jensen's lips that Jared promptly swallows. His arms are secured firmly around Jensen's torso, pulling him in close enough to fuse their skin together, and Jensen thanks the heavens for his clothes, because without them his body would have bid goodbye to self-control half an hour ago and proceeded to indulge in his primal urge to grind up against Jared's exposed hips. They're not dancing anymore, just pressed together as if one being as Jared kisses him soundly with no room for muffled protests. Jensen realizes halfway through the kiss when Jared slants their lips together and rubs his tongue at the seam of Jensen's lips that he has none in the first place.  
  
Jensen had almost forgotten about his convenient time limit when suddenly, the intrusive chiming of a noisy grandfather clock opportunely sticks its nose into Jared and Jensen's kiss and Jensen rips back like he's been electrified. He remembers Danneel's face, stern in her instructions and floating in midair, but stern nonetheless, and feels an unexplainable obligation to adhere to the fairytale's rules tug him toward the door and out of Jared's strong grip. He looks crestfallen, as if he's scared Jensen off with his bold kiss and searching tongue, and Jensen feels terrible when he catches his despondent eyes and turns on his heel.  
  
On his way out, Jensen runs straight into the door, lets out a colorful string of curse words, and wakes up with swear words still tingling on his tongue.  
  
\---  
  
In his next dream, Jensen feels nothing but incredible sluggishness coursing through his veins pulling him back into the tempting arms of slumber like he's Juliet Capulet feeling the effects of his roofie, brain waterlogged with visions of pillows, mattresses, and blissful sleep. He's about to start envisioning fluffy sheep dancing through his eyelids when a small hand shakes his shoulders, jerks his ankles, and douses his face with water.  
  
" _Careful_ , Misha," A soothing, soporific voice murmurs by Jensen's ear. It's too close and too loud for his eardrum to handle when he's still waking up, sputtering water onto his shirt as it slides up his nostrils and cools his face. There is the distinct sound of bustling and buzzing, like he's surrounded by a colony of bees, and when he opens his eyes, eight faces—seven unreasonably tiny—swim into view.  
  
"Goodness, Jensen," Misha says from Jensen's left. He's equipped with a water gun, incriminating him as the ruthless culprit who felt the need to squirt Jensen in the face with icy water to pull him from a comforting sleep. He frowns down at him like he's his mother when he came home after curfew on prom night.  
  
"Misha?" Jensen says foggily. The world is still very foggy. Misha clicks his tongue and gets ready to poise his water gun once more, aiming directly at Jensen's nose, when Chris shoves him out of the way with stubby arms and slides into Jensen's line of vision.  
  
"Put the water gun down, Misha, we ain't surfing in here," Chris admonishes. He looks small. Unreasonably so, as if he's shrunken in the dryer.  Jensen reaches out to pinch his nose, tiny as a gumdrop. He misses, hand landing on someone's head instead. "He's clearly entirely awake yet. Jared, kiss him again."  
  
There's a murmur of agreement. Small feet shuffle around his bed and suddenly, the one large head in the group comes swooping down and plants a sweet, lingering kiss on his lips. It tastes like sugar cane and oddly enough, apples. Jensen makes a noise. The pair of lips pressed against his own muffle it.  
  
The face pulls back, eyebrows knitted together in concern, and some of the fog swirling in front of Jensen's eyes like wiggly worms diminishes. He sees the Jared's fuzzy face looming over him. He's wearing a belt equipped with a lengthy sword and his feet are encased in sturdy leather boots. He looks like he's stepped out of the costume department of a colorful theatrical production and Jensen giggles. He sounds like he's spent the last forty-eight hours smoking something illegal in the back of a truck when he hears the sound of his hazy, high-pitched giggles.  
  
"It's like he's been drugged."  
  
"He has been drugged, you fool!"  
  
"Jared, kiss him again. You're curing him."  
  
Jared's face swoops down obediently once more. Jensen opens his mouth to say something and is cut off by an invasive tongue sliding over his lower lip that interrupts any questions he may have asked the eight swimmy faces in front of him. Jared pulls back a breath before planting a shorter, softer kiss on Jensen's lips, pulling back, and examining Jensen's face with worry lines embedded in his forehead.  
  
"Jensen?" Jared asks, voice troubled. Steve's face appears next to Jared's brandishing a miniature flashlight most presumably stolen from a doctor's office that he proceeds to flicker in Jensen's line of vision until he whines and writhes away.  
  
"The fuck," Jensen mumbles, shielding his face, and the group of friends crowded around him let out a collective sigh of relief. "Jared?"  
  
" _Jensen_ , we thought we lost you," Jared's voice breathes out, warm hand reaching out to fist his shirt and forehead dropping on his shoulder. Jensen reaches up to pat at the mop of hair burrowed in his collarbone and examines the line of pacified faces crammed around his bed. Misha puts down the water gun on a rickety wooden table, and that's when Jensen realizes he's not at home after having eaten some questionable Asian food that elongated his slumber by a few hours that prompted Jared to freak out and call over every one of Jensen's friends to watch him sleep in suspense and possibly commence the funeral plans, but rather encased in the close, cozy space of a handmade log cabin.  
  
Slowly, as his mind awakens and his vision clears, Jensen takes in the details. Firstly, he notices that Jared is the only person in the room excluding himself who he couldn't stuff into his pocket and carry through airport security. Secondly, he notes that the entire house is approximately one room, complete with the lumpy bed Jensen is occupying, a crackling fire roasting in the corner, and a mahogany hat rack holding seven miniature caps.  
  
"Why are you guys so small?" Jensen demands the fun-sized versions of his friends. Jared lifts his nose from Jensen's neck and shushes his inquiries by pushing a finger atop his moving mouth.  
  
"Shh," Jared shushes, smoothing back Jensen's hair, "Take it easy." He slides his finger from Jensen's lips and replaces it with a kiss, pushing their mouths together and cupping his face. It feels like a welcome home kiss multiplied by ten, like Jensen's been lost at sea or off to war and returned to his humble abode with missing limbs and near death encounters while Jared pulled him into his arms.  
  
"Why do you have a sword?" Jensen mumbles on Jared's lips, but it comes out, efficiently muffled, as _vy do fuu hab a ford_.  
  
"Getting here was no easy feat," Jared says, pulling back from their kiss and climbing up onto the bed and slinging an arm around Jensen's shoulders, tracing patterns on his forearm and unbuckling his sword from his belt. He hands it to Chris, who all but falls over attempting to catch such a heavy weight thrust upon his arms.  
  
Jensen lets himself be manhandled into Jared's arms if only because he's adequately distracted trying to decipher the situation. He drags his hand down his own cheek and feels rough stubbles, as if he's been in a coma for two weeks.  
  
"Have I been in a coma for two weeks?"  
  
"Just about," Misha informs him, "If bringing Jared would have failed, we would have started digging a grave out back."  
  
Jensen sits up to peer over the chunk removed from the wall replaced by a circular window situated in the midst of the cabin. He catches a glimpse of a quaint, thriving garden full of blooming begonias, thorny bushes of roses lining the crumbling fence, and a flourishing apple tree.  
  
"I ate an apple," Jensen says slowly upon catching sight of the shiny apples swinging from the leafy branches perched near the window, "And then only true love's kiss could save—oh, just wonderful."  
  
Jared tweaks Jensen's nose and smiles. Misha tuts, "A thank you would be nice," and the moment is efficiently ruined.  
  
"Which one of the dwarfs are you, Misha? Grumpy?" Jensen says, who is promptly solaced when Jared chuckles into the hair at the sensitive spot under his ear and pulls him closer.  
  
"Back to your old self," Jared murmurs, dragging his nose up his cheek and discreetly shooing away the murmuring dwarf replicas until they file out into the garden to tend to the spring tulips. "Kiss me, Jensen."  
  
Jensen leans in to fulfill his wish and is suddenly assaulted with Misha, Steve, and Chris all throwing apples from the garden directly at Jensen's face and cackling as one is smacked directly into Jensen's nose.  
  
Jensen wakes up to the bitter reality that his nose suffered the blunt of the tumble from the bed his sleeping body decided to subject him to and that no one is pitching apples or other thick-skinned fruit at his face. He peels himself off the floor, wrangles the sheets from his ankles, and rubs the side of his throbbing nose.  
  
He doesn't know which is worse about his dream—the fact that Jensen leant into Jared's kiss without objection or that Misha felt the need to flush the moment down the toilet with his collection of firm produce.  
  
\---  
  
Jensen hides in room Googling surefire ways to control dreaming on his phone for a few hours after he wakes up until his stomach's need for food overpowers his desire to stay away from his best friend, who—with Jensen's luck—is probably exercising shirtlessly in the kitchen while rivulets of salty sweat gather on his back. Jensen risks the worst and tentatively treads down the stairs ready to raid the pantry and return upstairs when he notices that Jared's lounging over the couch in his pajama pants with a beer in his hand. _Fight Club_ is playing on television, a remote slung in Jared's hand as he idly watches Brad Pitt get into another bloody fist fight. It's a step up from Disney classics and Jensen is immensely relieved at the sight of such innocent manliness.  
  
"I knew you were lazy, Padalecki, but pajama pants after two in the afternoon?"  
  
Jared looks up at Jensen, who's bemusedly examining Jared's limbs monopolizing the couch, and plucks at the waistband of his pants, "Oh. I slept here," he mumbles around the neck of his beer bottle.  
  
"What's wrong with your room?"  
  
"Nothin'," Jared murmurs, voice low like he's already a little tipsy after indulging in a few afternoon beers, "Just felt like sleeping on the couch." He looks up at Jensen. He's wordless for a long, pregnant pause as if he's taking the time to search for proper words. It scares Jensen to watch Jared use a filter on his thoughts. He suddenly feels intensely uncomfortable in his own skin and shifts back and forth on his feet.  
  
"How's the movie?" Jensen says. He feels the uncomfortable urge to keep the conversation alive pull at him. It's incredibly uncomfortable, like he's making small talk with a stuffy principal or unpleasant coworker. He wants Jared to sit up, insult Brad Pitt's hair, order a pizza, and make room for Jensen on the couch like they're still capable of interacting without awkward pauses and painful moments of agonizing eye contact where Jensen addresses the nearest piece of furniture and Jared sifts through his own words. Jared doesn't sit up, nor does he mention Brad Pitt's hairstyle. Jensen's fingers tie themselves into a fist.  
  
"All right," Jared says, "Wanna watch it with me?"  
  
Jared cocks his head to the lone armchair sitting in the corner in invitation. It's been here in this living room for years but the leather is still shiny, free of ass prints, and so pristine it's almost uncomfortable to sit in. For years they've shared the couch, knocking shoulders and knees while pulling popcorn bags from one another's hands. Never before have personal bubbles and appropriate amounts of space separating their bodies been an issue that both of them were consciously aware of. Jared is always touching him. He's touchier than Jensen's own mother. His hand is always clapping on his thigh or their legs are pressed together on sofas, always too close but never too unnerving. Jensen's stomach churns.  
  
"I think I'll pass. I still haven't memorized next week's script," Jensen says, and it's a massive lie. He's spent so much time cooped up in his room like he's hibernating that he's had nothing to entertain himself but the Angry Birds game on his phone and his upcoming lines. He rubs at the back of his neck. Jared sees right through him like he's x-raying his way through his fibs directly to his traitorous thoughts of candor.  
  
"Do we need to talk about it?" He says gently. He's not sitting up or fixing Jensen with a stern stare that would leave no room for argument. He's still laying on the couch like a cat napping in the sun, completely unbothered, and Jared's blasé attitude almost hits a nerve that irks Jensen. He scratches at his stomach, clothing suddenly too itchy, and shrugs in a way that is much too noncommittal considering how much that goddamn kiss has overwhelmed his thoughts while he's both conscious and unconscious.  
  
"No," Jensen grits out, "It was a goddamn kiss. I don't know why the hell you did it but it didn't mean anything. Not to me."  
  
Jared doesn't say a word for the longest minute of Jensen's life he's ever spent in Jared's presence without his best friend rattling off about one inane topic or another.  
  
"Yeah," He says, but he sounds more like he's acquiescing to Jensen's statement than agreeing, "You're right. Let's forget about it." He shifts his attention back to the television as if Jensen's already left the room.  
  
Jensen considers stealing a few cases of beer out of the fridge and driving over to Danneel's just so he can sulk and watch Fight Club without the additional awkwardness. He thinks about all the times he's watched this with Jared, reenacting drunken versions of the major fight scenes with uncoordinated swings of their fists and roaring in laughter at Jared's mockery of all of Brad Pitt's lines by repeating them in Yoda voices. Watching with Danneel commenting on Brad Pitt's chest would be salt in the wound.  
  
He wants to ask _we've gotten drunk on this couch hundreds of times, but last time you just had to kiss me, huh?_ but Jensen summons up his tact and good friend skills and sits down in the uncomfortable armchair.  
  
Even when the movie is almost over and Jensen has propped his feet up onto the coffee table, the leather still feels sticky on his bare skin and the pillows don't cushion his spine. He looks over at his usual spot in the couch, cushions sagging where his ass resides almost every evening, occupied instead with Jared's stretched legs.  
  
\---  
  
When Jensen falls asleep, he hears the gentle sound of swaying water and wonders briefly if he fell asleep while cocooned in his bathtub after finishing Fight Club.  
  
Of course, that's not the case.  
  
Slowly, blank spots start filling in for Jensen, incorporating all of his senses in the altered reality. There's the soothing scent of water lilies, clean water, and cool outdoor air that whips his nostrils with a sense of freshness that is impossible to catch indoors, and at his feet, there's the wooden planks of a boat rocking underneath him.  
  
It's rocking gently along on an enormous lake shimmering a dark, silky blue hue under the sunset, and when he looks up, he sees Jared sporting a pristine white button down and rotating a pair of strong wooden oars along the waves. His hair is neatly tucked behind his ears, glossy and well kempt, entire face refined as if gently chiseled and smoothed to absolute perfection that accentuates the strong line of his jaw. There's something rehearsed and elegant about him that Jensen has never seen Jared carry himself with before, too used to the gangly joke of a man with his limbs amok as he gesticulates his stories and falls over himself while reciting lines. Still, he's beautiful, the pink clouds soaking up the colorful light of the sunset managing to lick up Jared's face and illuminate his features almost angelically. The entire setting is like something plucked directly from a child's fairytale book, and that's when Jensen once more remembers that _it is_.  
  
Jensen tries not to pitch himself off of the canoe and make friends with the sea monsters, and when he catches sight of a lobster equipped with Misha's face clambering up the side of the boat and a pair of eels lounging on a set of lakeside rocks wearing Chris and Steve's unmistakable expressions, he realizes that in this dream, he probably already has.  
  
"I should be able to control my own dreams," Jensen tries to say, but nothing escapes his throat. His lips part and his throat muscles flutter, but nothing but puffs of air escape his mouth. He tries clearing his throat. He tries rubbing at his jugular. He tries slowly swallowing three times. His mouth remains hopelessly mute.  
  
The silence sets the scene for Jensen. This is _Little Mermaid_ , one of his sister's favorite classics, and this time his subconscious has cooked up a scenario where he has magically transformed into Ariel and Jared is the charming, friendly Prince Eric. Why he is always the girl—or in this case, teenage mermaid—while Jared gets to fulfill the role of manly, muscled princes, is beyond the capacity of his mental power that Jensen desperately wishes to consult his unconscious mind about.  
  
He is glad to see, however, that he isn't sporting a fluffy bow in his hair or donning a cottony dress, nor is he modeling a par of billowing Arabian royalty pants that were stolen from MC Hammer's closet. He's dressed in black slacks and a green shirt, and Jensen takes a moment to sigh in relief that although he is a pretty little redheaded girl, he doesn't have to dress like one in order to fit the character bill.  
  
Suddenly, a chubby seagull flies overhead and latches onto the tree branch hanging low into the lake with its leaves tickling the surface, screeching loudly as if poorly attempting to replicate a soprano concerto piece. Jared nearly drops the oars into the lake and the seagull sends Jensen an impish grin. Jensen can do little but stare in wonder.  
  
"We need to set the mood," Misha murmurs from the boat's rim, except Misha is talking as a scarlet lobster, which only continues to further boggle Jensen's mind. Jensen realizes faintly that his unconscious mind is capable of startling imagination.  
  
"I'm sorry this isn't very romantic," Jared's voice says sheepishly, interrupting Jensen from his thoughts, and when he looks up he's almost baffled to see a delicate blush painting Jared's cheeks, "At least the sunset is nice to look at."  
  
 _You're nice to look at, too_ , Jensen's brain helpfully supplies, and he momentarily blesses his speechlessness that permits him to keep capricious thoughts like that to himself. The sun is setting steadily now, sheathing the horizon in a gentle glow, and Jensen feels the romance wrack through his body like it's being injected into his blood.  
  
"First, we need music," Misha mumbles in a voice that smells of mischief and meddling, and promptly, a colony of crickets perched on a nearby log begin chirping as if on cue. The boat sways past and Jared hums along. "Some percussion," Misha says to the turtles, who swiftly flip onto the shells and allow the ducks to drum on their stomachs in a catchy rhythm, "And romantic wind."  
  
A breeze akin to a warm fan wafting through the strands of his hair and grazing past his nose starts as if Misha is capable of controlling the weather while bestowed with powers only a sea lobster can behold, and surely enough, the mood takes a shift.  
  
The sunset is almost complete, dipping under the horizon line as the moon flickers on the lake's surface in replacement of the light of the dusk and the purpled clouds, bathing the lake and the boat in a quixotic glow.  
  
"Idealistic for kissing," Misha's voice whispers in Jensen's ear, scampering up his backside before jumping agilely from his shoulder to the water. Jensen can't help but agree. This is a storybook setting for some old-fashioned smooching, and when Jensen's knee brushes against Jared's and their eyes lock across the boat, he realizes that he's not all too averse to the idea.  
  
"There you see him," Misha's voice, honeyed and low as he sings and croons from atop the lily pads. "Sitting there across the way. He don't got a lot to say, but there's about him."  
  
Chris and Steve the eels have taken to dragging their slimy tails over makeshift guitars crudely made of out bits of nature like tree bark drifting in the waves and skinny stalks of grass. Fish swim alongside the boat, rippling in the water and steering the boat through the lake. The screeching seagull from before, alongside the ducks and turtles, has taken to humming and swaying along to Misha's tune in an adequate performance, and when Jensen looks up, he  notices Jared intently watching him as if he wants to learn all of his secrets and memorize every inch of his freckled face.  
  
Misha's skinny antennae tickle Jared's neck as he once more crawls up the boat. Jared looks away from Jensen to wave idly by his shoulder, "Do you hear something?"  
  
Misha scurries back into the lake and Jensen shakes his head solemnly. There is something extremely comical about seeing Jared—not to mention Misha—like this, completely unaware of realty and focused solely on Jensen, bypassing the turtle's offering their stomachs as drums and the singing lobsters swaying at the head of the boat.  
  
"And you don't know why, but you're dying to try, you wanna kiss the boy. It don't take a word, not a single word, go on and kiss the boy."  
  
"I feel really bad not knowing your name," Jared says, chin resting in one hand as he surveys Jensen as if attempting to surmise his name from his appearance alone while Misha slides into a chorus of _sha la la la la la_ s, "Maybe I could guess. Batman? Adolf?"  
  
"It's Jensen," Misha says, floating alongside the boat while the eels and fish take over the lyrics, " _Jensen_."  
  
Jared perks up at the hint, "Jensen?" he asks, and Jensen can't help but indulge in him with a nod, because as amusing as it would have been to hear Jared tick off every character in Star Trek in search for the right name, Jensen has a feeling it would spoil the moment that the lakeside creatures are all trying valiantly to achieve for the pair. "Okay. Jensen. _Jensen_ ," Jared says, trying the name out on his tongue as it rolls from his lips. He reaches over the boat and takes Jensen's fingers into his own. The oars have vanished, seemingly superfluous as the fish propel the boat toward a lagoon eclipsed from the rest of the lake and curtained away with strings of seaweed. Misha's antennae helpfully part the halves of the curtain for the boat to sway without disturbance toward the secluded region.  
  
It's cooler here, eclipsed in shadows that only vivify the romance that swims around them in the shape of crooning animals humming harmony and back-up vocals. The seagull and guitar-strumming eels have relocated to a nook of rocks tucked into the lagoon, every note and sung word reverberating in soft echoes. Every creature living in the lake seems to have joined in on the concert, a group of frogs swaying in tandem on a collection of broad leaves and schools of fish swimming in rhythmic patterns underneath the boat. Jensen almost doesn't know where to focus his attention.  
  
Then he looks up at Jared's face, shining in the moonlight and completely concentrated on every curve and contour of Jensen's face as is mesmerized by his sheer presence, hands a warm cocoon around Jensen's as he threads their fingers together and smiles, the type of smile that crinkles at his eyes and has the tip of his pink tongue poking out in between his teeth, like when Jensen forgets his line on set and they burst out into simultaneous laughter. It gratifies Jensen greatly to know that even in dreams where Jensen is nothing but a mere mute stranger to Jared, he can still manage to paint a smile on his lips that uses his whole face to express his happiness. Without words, without a single sarcastic remark or esoteric comment that Jared alone would be able to find humor in, Jared is smiling at him like Jensen stuffed a hanger into his mouth.  
  
And the thing is, Jensen desperately wants to be able to say things, speak words, articulate himself. He's not even sure what he would say in this very moment were he given the opportunity and the voice necessary for speaking, the boat swaying them along in a gentle journey along the water's ripples as their knees touch and fish jump rhythmically around the boat in lieu of fireworks while Misha orchestrates over the music. He's always been able to talk to Jared, to express himself both eloquently and gracelessly, tell him when he needs a piss and when he gets a hankering for marshmallows in the middle of the night. Ever since they first met, sitting side by side with furled scripts in hand and exchanging childhood Texan boy stories of their siblings, the conversation flowed.  
  
And now, with the stupid kiss and the stupid aftermaths and the stupid Tangled DVD Jensen never wanted to watch in the first place, someone's stuck a roadblock through their easy communication and unbreakable bond, road crew and traffic making it almost impossible for them to interact again. They used to laugh at the same time and finish each other's sentences when they were both exhausted and overworked, and now, there's a rift full of so much tension they need to find Samurai swords if they ever want to cut through it. Jensen hates it more than he hates continuously being stuck as pretty little princesses in his dreams. He hates missing his best friend when he's always one room down the hall. He hates being mute when he's around Jared.  
  
Jensen looks up from his knees just in time to see Jared lean in, fingers sliding into Jensen's palm and knees knocking together as he bows forward in the cramped boat until his eyes are clear and bright in front of Jensen's face. The kiss is an excruciating second away, and right when Jensen leans in to meet his lips, the boat tips over and sends them both crashing into water.  
  
Waking up, Jensen realizes darkly upon opening his eyes to his dim bedroom ceiling, is not a release as sweet as he had imagined.  
  
His first instinct is to grab every one of Jared's Disney movies, drive to the nearest empty field, and shoot them to satisfying bits of irreparable pieces. His second is to find Jared.  
  
It's late, he knows that much. The moon is glaring at him from his window when he peers outside at the jet black horizon and throws his covers from his waist, pushing open his door and not bothering to fiddle with the hall light. He marches down the hall and doesn't knock, coo, or tread lightly when he opens Jared's ajar bedroom door and stands at the foot of his bed where Jared's sprawled over his mattress with his feet sticking out from the hem of his bedspread.  
  
He doesn't hesitate. He crawls onto the bed with no finesse, not bothering to flick on Jared's beside lamp or warn him as to the body straddling his hips. He pushes the offending sheets out of the way, settles himself on Jared's waist, and then proceeds to shake his shoulders until he wakes up from his stage four sleep.  
  
With the help of Jensen's impatience, Jared jolts awake with a garbled gasp and a high-pitched yelp when he notices that a warm body is on top of him. He blinks up at his shadowy intruder, blinks again for good measure, and then his hands fly to Jensen's hips.  
  
" _Jensen_?!"  
  
"You are so stupid," Jensen says, and he doesn't waste time grabbing Jared's hands and pinning them immobile over his head onto the pillows, "And that kiss was so stupid. And apparently I can't stop thinking about it because every goddamn night, _there you are_ , and I don't even like Disney."  
  
"Jensen, what the hell?" Jared's voice somehow manages to be groggy and acutely focused on the conversation simultaneously. Jensen leans in until he's close enough to smell the musk of his aftershave and pushes his forehead against Jared's chin. He breathes him in, the smell of cottony sheets and warm sleep on Jared's skin, thumbs brushing over the beat of his pulse on the wrists he's holding captive, and tries hard not to laugh.  
  
"You're right," he admits, suddenly breathless, the burn of Jared's evening stubble catching the sensitive skin of his forehead, "I am the girl. I'm _always_ the girl. And that makes me Rapunzel, and you Flynn Rider."  
  
"Jensen," Jared says, and all traces of sleep are gone from his voice, replaced with an astonished awe that has Jensen reeling, the beat of the pulse under his thumb speeding up. He picks his head up from Jared's chin and looks at his eyes, devoid of any Disney surrealism but unbelievably bright in this dark bedroom at two in the morning, staring at him like he's waited his whole life to hear Jensen admit this to him in a soft whisper in the night.  
  
"Now please kiss me so Disney can stop haunting me," Jensen begs, and Jared doesn't need further instructions.  
  
Jared's lips arch up against Jensen's, warm and dry like the sheets under both of them, their legs tangling as Jared sweeps his tongue into Jensen's mouth. It's rough, unyielding, and best of all, Jensen can't smell a single ounce of beer tainting Jared's soft lips as they move against his own. He feels like there should be more questions, more answers, more _talking_ , but right now in his sleepy, aroused state that has his erection pressing insistently into Jared's thigh from the confines of his boxers, he doesn't want to sit and talk. He wants to finish what multiple kisses and torturous dreams made him anticipate—romantic confessions in the light of the moonlight and frantic make outs with urgent wandering hands roaming over one another's chests.  
  
They pour a week's worth of frustration and silence into their kiss, Jensen tugging Jared's bottom lip into his mouth and Jared groaning hungrily for more. Suddenly, everything makes sense—the Rapunzel metaphors, the drunken smiles, and the botched kisses with too much wet tongue. Jared _wants_ this, _has_ wanted this for all Jensen can surmise, and Jensen is more than pleased to indulge in his desires.  
  
Suddenly, his grip on Jared's wrists slip as Jared flips them over and breaks their kiss, one broad hand resting low on Jensen's hip where his boxers edge downward. He's looking at Jensen like he's a porcelain doll worth pampering and loving, examining his body like a famished man finding an abandoned canteen of water, and Jensen can do little but catch the breath he lost in Jared's mouth and slide a hand over his cheek to brush his thumb under his eyelid and watch his gaze meet Jensen's. It's an intense, fiercely adoring gaze that instantly makes Jensen tremble with want and reach for Jared's shirt to promptly deposit it on the floor. Jared raises his arms with no objections as Jensen yanks off the garment and pulls Jared back into another heated kiss.  
  
It's like he's fourteen again, back in his Disney-saturated dreams where his heart pumps loudly against his chest and his hormones run rampant. Jared is reducing him to a quivering mass of pure, undulating desire intermingled with an ardent sense of affection. This is his best friend slipping his tongue into his mouth and swathing his body with his own, sturdy hands multi-tasking alongside to the teasing licks of his tongue to tickle over and discover all of Jensen's sensitive areas, ranging from his pebbled nipples to the skin of his inner thigh.  
  
"Wait," Jared murmurs against Jensen's slick lips, pulling back to stare down at his flushed face and swollen lips while Jensen whines and tries to pull Jared back into another kiss, "What about Disney haunting you?"  
  
"Don't worry about it," Jensen says, tangling his fingers into Jared's hair and arching up to leave kitten licks over the expanse of Jared's neck, which promptly elicits a moan. It's always glistening with a sheen of sweet after Jared jogs with his dogs in the morning, a thin shine that Jensen is already fantasizing about licking off when Jared finishes exercising. Jensen's mind is reeling, creating all sorts of scenarios in which he and Jared waste away their hiatus lying in sticky sheets pooling at their hips while they exchange lazy handjobs and kiss through dinner on warm summer evenings.  
  
Jared gets with the program quickly. He straddles Jensen's hips and dips his nose into the juncture of his neck, sucking and nipping marks that will be purpled blotches of ownership by tomorrow. Jared doesn't pull back until Jensen's neck is sore. He smiles fondly, still attempting to find the breath lost from his lungs, and squeezes Jared's hip.  
  
"Possessive bastard, you're gonna leave marks."  
  
"Maybe I want to," Jared murmurs on Jensen's neck, lips dragging over his bite marks to soothe the burn, voice husky and deep like he knows that he's entirely in control, and Jensen tries hard not to whimper and clutch at the man above of him. He finds it almost ludicrous that it took a series of seriously bizarre dreams inspired by Disney assaulting his unconscious before he could see what was right in front of him.  
  
 _Dear lord_ , Jensen thinks breathlessly as Jared travels further south and licks over a sensitive nipple, _I am the biggest cliché_.  
  
It's a little bit cheesy—best friends for years after meeting at work and moving in together who happened to fall in love after a drunken, seemingly mistaken encounter. That Disney is the one who opened Jensen's eyes is a low blow, but he has little room to argue when Jared makes quick work of sliding Jensen's pajama pants from his legs.  
  
Undressing is a necessary evil that Jensen would rather do without when he starts to focus on undoing the button of Jared's bottoms and shimmies them down his thighs. Jared's boxers are tented, bulging with the promise of mouthwatering sex to come, and Jensen tries hard to calm down. He pulls those down too, never one to waste time on gentlemanly patience, and Jared has little complaints to voice at Jensen's haste.  
  
His own boxers are next to go, Jensen kicking them from his ankles as Jared throws his own across the room, and suddenly, the atmosphere takes a dramatic shift. From demanding hormones and dilated pupils brimming with unbridled lust, Jared's hands turn gentle as he ghosts them up Jensen's skin and cups his cheeks to pull Jensen into another kiss. It suddenly feels very real to Jensen, very different from all of his dreams, very monumental. He knows that they can't go back after crossing this line; they can't go back to joking around on set and sitting on the couch together. Thing is, Jensen's not scared. He wants to sit on the same couch for years to come, thighs pressed together and lips leaving lazy kisses on exposed shoulders. He wants to cross this line, and if took a collection of Walt Disney animations for him to realize it, Jensen's made his peace with that fact.  
  
"Jensen," Jared breathes out, and it's not until Jensen catches sight of Jared's gaze focused on the V of his hips and the curl of his hard erection that he realizes that their kiss ended a few moments ago. He allows himself to look down at Jared's length, long and equally hard as Jensen's, and incredibly tempting for Jensen to reach out and wrap his hand around. He gives into his desire and curls his fingers around Jared's dick, keening at the appreciative moan leaving Jared's throat, thumb sliding over the gathering of precome leaking from the head of his dick, nail briefly brushing over the slit before he alternates to slow, firm pumps that have Jared shaking to stay propped upright over Jensen's body.  
  
"C'mere," Jensen says, free hand sliding up to grip Jared's chin with two fingers and guide their lips together in a wet kiss, "Touch me."  
  
Jared doesn't need multiple invitations. He nods, presses his sweaty forehead against Jensen's, and mirrors Jensen's ministrations by wrapping a strong, unrelenting palm around Jensen's shaft and pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth. He's gentle, soft and slow, like he wants to savor every bit of Jensen like he's a chocolate sundae on an unbearably hot July afternoon while Jensen tries hard not to melt in his hands. They copy each other's movements, eyes finding each other as they speed up their strokes, Jared slotting their hips together and grinding down to create delicious friction between their bodies.  
  
Jared has a body meant for sex, with large hands and a sinfully soft mouth coupled with R-rated moans. Having him on top of Jensen, trembling and shaking into Jensen's neck, is like a magically materialized wet dream that Jensen is instantly addicted to. To think that before now, he's looked at Jared's hands and seen hands, looked at Jared's lips and seen lips, and looked at the line of Jared's dick in his trousers and looked steadfastly away, is almost hard to believe. Never is he going to let these firm fingers and long legs slip away from his grasp again. He kisses Jared, hard and needy, and pushes his hips up into Jared's until he wraps his fingers around both of their leaking lengths and builds up a steady rhythm. Their bodies move like a symphony, invisible strings keeping them fused together as if pulled by a force stronger than gravity, Jared catching all of Jensen's moans in his mouth and sharing his own. Their fingers, sweaty and fumbling, latch onto one another's shoulders and hips, leaving crescent marks as their fingernails dig into sensitive flesh.  
  
"Jensen," Jared says, slowing down the pace of his strokes, "Wanna come in my mouth?"  
  
Jensen tries not to whimper like a schoolgirl and can do little but nod as Jared briefly kisses his spit-slick lips and tugs his bottom lip into his mouth before slithering down his naked body.  
  
When Jared winks from his position at Jensen's hips, pushes aside his thighs, and then proceeds to lick a stripe up his erection before taking the head in his mouth and licking clean the traces of his precome with an eager tongue, Jensen can't hold back a litany of pleased moans that fall from his mouth like a verbal waterfall. His tongue, it seems, is as sinful as his mouth, working in quick, efficient licks that leave Jensen fisting the sheets. Jared's left hand is gripping the base of Jensen's dick where his bobbing mouth can't reach, his right hand dipped down beneath his own thighs to roughly jerk his own throbbing dick to completion, and the sight is downright unfair to an immobile Jensen victim to his own pleasure. He's stuck between a vicious tug of war in which he tries to decide if he wants to yank Jared up the bed just to feel the heavy, warm weight of his length in his hand and listen to Jared whimper in his ear while he flicks his wrist and strokes him hard and tenderly, however he likes it best, or if he wants to succumb to the pleasure of Jared's hot, wet mouth suckling around his dick and turn boneless.  
  
Jared starts humming around Jensen's length, something that sounds suspiciously like _Mother Knows Best_ , which Jensen forgives him for because that song is damn catchy and because Jared is sucking him further into his mouth until Jensen hits the back of his throat. He sucks and licks like he's genuinely enjoying this blowjob past the point of pure necessity and consideration for Jensen's pleasure, and Jensen comes so fast down Jared's unsuspecting throat he barely has time to tap out a warning on Jared's shoulder. Jared's lips shudder around Jensen's rapidly softening dick, flaccid and sensitive on his lower lip when Jensen is spent and sated, and a second later Jared lets out a soft cry of his own signaling his own orgasm as his hand works away at pumping his dick. Jensen musters up the remainder of his sleepy energy and sits up, wrapping his hand around Jared's erection and tugging once, twice, and then being rewarded with the sticky aftermaths of Jared's orgasm.  
  
When they're both satisfied, eyelids half mast and brains fogged with the alluring idea of sleep, they meet each other's gazes as if confirming what just happened. This is the part of the Disney movie that's not child friendly, and suddenly, both of them laugh.  
  
It's extremely reassuring to hear Jared's groggy chortles laced with an undercurrent of sleepiness that Jensen is all too happy to indulge in, as if suddenly their bodies have remembered that it's past three in the morning now that their lust is satiated. He cleans off his hand and the splotches on Jared's stomach before they crust and pulls Jared down onto the pillows with him. Their hands interlace lazily on the pillow, just two of their fingers locked together, and Jensen can't even bring himself to complain about how much they're resigning themselves to becoming a corny cliché by holding hands atop the frayed pillowcase while they fall asleep to the sound of summertime crickets and the refrigerator clinking downstairs.  
  
Jared grabs the sheets, hitches them around their hips, and hooks a leg over Jensen's, finally content. Jensen smiles, kisses the stubble gathering on Jared's chin, and follows suit, cushioning his head on the pillow next to Jared's and closing his eyes, conscience free and stomach pleased for the first night in nearly a week.  
  
\---  
  
After a long, relaxing sleep that thoroughly replenishes his body, Jensen wakes up to soft sunlight dancing over his cheek and Jared's nose brushing against his own in gentle Eskimo kisses.  
  
"Mornin', sleeping beauty," Jared murmurs, and Jensen is slowly pulled from his slumber at the sound of his voice. Jared's dry lips kissing him awake with a gentle morning peck that slowly deepens with a brush of tongue saves him the trouble of remembering last night's wet wonderfulness, and he finally pries open his drowsy eyes to the sight of Jared's face a mere few inches away from his own. He smirks and yawns, stretching his arms over his head and wiggling his sated limbs.  
  
"Mornin'," he says, fingers furling around Jared's thigh.  
  
"Had a good dream?"  
  
"No," Jensen says, and a broad grin spreads over his face as he rolls on top of his best friend, "Totally dreamless."

  
_"Remember: Always let your conscience be your guide."_ \-- **Blue Fairy, Pinochio  
  
** _"Keep your chin up. Someday there will be happiness again."_ **\--Robin Hood**


End file.
